


How Do You Steal A Life?

by theoddling



Category: Leverage
Genre: Angst, It's sad but it's fluffy?, Post-Canon, many years from now, snapshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-06
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-11 20:44:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11722215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theoddling/pseuds/theoddling
Summary: Working Title, might change it later.Many years after the founding of Leverage International, a hacker, a hitter, and a thief return to their roots for one of their hardest jobs yet, accepting that sometimes you can't do anything.





	How Do You Steal A Life?

“It was a heart attack,” the doctors said gently.

“He went peacefully,” nurses offered like it was a comfort.

“There was nothing any of you could have done, but it’s not so bad. He didn’t suffer…” condolences and platitudes stung where they should have been balms.

“What do we do now?” the blonde woman asked, seeming unfazed to anyone who didn’t know her, didn’t see how her hand clung to the tall black man beside her or how she trembled just slightly.

“We…we mourn him and take care of her and…” the other man with the pair spoke gruffly, his voice nearly a growl, and his hands clenched and unclenched in a pattern of frustration.

“Never thought any of us would go out this way,” the last of the trio offered almost lightly, not bothered in the slightest by the woman’s vice grip or the storm in the other man’s eyes.

“Let’s get out of here,” the woman added.

“Never liked hospitals,” the older of the two men agreed.

~

“You’re all acting like you’re absolutely lost,” his widow’s eyes were red with tears but her voice was steady as she studied the three younger people who sat, almost huddled, on their couch, her couch now. “You’ve been on your own for years.”

“There’s nothing to fight here,” she smiled at the man’s gravelly accent, so much sharper in person than it ever was over the phone.

A second voice added, “It’s not an injustice we can fix.” The man who spoke never looked up from the phone he was fiddling with and she knew it was because he was trying to hide his tears.

“We can’t steal him back,” the woman between them concluded, frustration mingling with the grief in her voice. She at least was content to cry openly.

“Sometimes death just happens. It just is.”

All three flinched back from the reminder.

“He’d hardly want you to fall apart and grieve like this. I know I pulled you off a job. Go finish it. I’ll make sure the funeral doesn’t happen without you.”

Unconsciously, they all nodded, falling back into the routine of being players who took orders, not gave them.

~

_Nathan Ford passed away this Thursday, June 3, at 2:14am, from a heart attack which claimed his life while he slept. Survived by his loving wife Laura, ex-wife Maggie Collins-Sterling, and three adopted children, Mr. Ford was 61 when he died. Funeral services will be held at the Church of St. Nicholas in Boston, Massachusetts on Tuesday. As Mr. Ford’s profession reached far and wide before his retirement, all mourners will be welcome. In lieu of flowers, the family requests you offer donations to organizations that specialize in research into childhood cancers._


End file.
